Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Inspired to work in ‘miniature’ the other day I started on a limited availability project – Christmas Elf accessories in the form of hand knit scarves and hand made tutu skirts that fit perfectly & are absolutely adorable on a certain popular Elf that often spends time sitting upon a shelf and sometimes being a little mischievous. These fun tiny scarves and tutu skirts are great to accessorize any Christmas Elf or even Fashion dolls. Now originally I posted photos of our family’s personal Elf that is a certain brand but have since changed them in this post after having some issues arise that required me to do so elsewhere. That said, my handmade little accessories for dolls, snowmen or Elves are currently available in my Etsy shop – Made to order tutu skirts in white and scarves in-stock and made to order (see shop listing for more info). Now the fun part will be deciding when our Elf will come back to visit this year… a lot of people welcome their Elf back right around or after Thanksgiving. We’ve been thinking December 1st more like December 5th in our house… though this year that will be much closer to Thanksgiving after all – so we shall see… I am starting to think going with a 12 days of Christmas visit would be fine at this point – less work and without going into the issues I’ve had on this project… I’m a little disenchanted with a particular Elf.

As shown below, Vintage Skipper Barbie models the white scarf – a great accessory for Barbie or other Fashion dolls.

I’ve been quiet here on the blog I know – it has been a learning curve of balancing managing a home, raising a very busy pre-school age child while keeping up on our family life & blog, my creative and crafty projects in addition to my home garden and its bounty that kept me busy in the kitchen canning and preserving the harvests. Blogging here continues to be a work in progress as I find my groove with it. I have been working on stocking my Etsy shop with inventory including a couple new items not offered before as well as more wonderful scarves in time for the chilly Fall & Winter weather. Alas so many projects and so little time holds quite true in our house this year with many home projects big and small, long hours for the Mister at work which means long days for this momma (translation: one tired momma both mentally and physically), and some personal craft projects (completed & new ones in the works), as well as some much needed family trips and travel early this year.

This year despite my efforts to take the easy way out for Halloween gently suggesting that perhaps my girl would like to be the cute Lady Bug she was last year in the super cool Old Navy Love Bug costume that still fits her – It became quite apparent that wasn’t working and she really wanted to be a Fairy with wings and a wand this year. So, after much thought of how I could come up with something we have already (tutu and pink butterfly wings) I spent many hours on Pinterest looking at various ideas for fairy costumes and wands. A couple weeks ago while thrifting , I looked at the Halloween costumes hoping to find something to work with what we had at home when I stumbled upon green fairy wings just the right size and had already found just the right green tank top super cheap (with next summer in mind actually). A trip to Hobby Lobby for tutu supplies, a second trip to Joann’s for ribbon (to wrap the dowel I got at Fred Meyer while grocery shopping) and now my girl gets to be a Fairy like Tinkerbell. I have to say it was fun & she’s going to be adorable & have a great dress up outfit to add to her very limited collection. Oh, I also picked up tulle and a little something to make my own Fairy inspired festive costume (minus wings) to take her trick or treating. Pictures below are of the fairy costume closer to finished (added little ‘flowery tulle accents on each shoulder), long sleeve white top that will go under the green tank top.

Fun part is we live in the Inland NW and while last year was actually kind of “warm” for Halloween this year will not be quite as “warm” but won’t be freezing – so last year would have been a better year for Fairy wings & those things and this year cozy Love Bug would be perfect! Oh Well! So we may end up with a little Tinkerbell inspired Fairy who loves Hello Kitty being bundled up in her warm HK coat. I will get a picture of the whole costume later & update this post. Below is my ‘cosutme’ – easy peasy over a black skirt & tights with black top & perhaps my cozy lime green vest – we shall see. I was going for coordinating a little with my girl & ability to repurpose into different costume(s) without spending a whole lot.